Amuse-BOUCHE

Chasing news that googlers will soon outnumber emailers online comes a website that makes tuning into the flesh-and-blood domain even less compelling. After all, you can sip a brew while you’re surfing craftbeerandfood.org, which provides handy food-pairing suggestions, but even better, a searchable guide to seasonal and special-edition releases by state and time of year. The only Texas brewery listed to date for Fall ’08 is Houston’s Saint Arnold, which will be peddling Oktoberfest in time for all that sausage and polka in your near future (and in time for the Current’s AleFest, October 18, at HemisFair)! But A-B’s got no geographical standards at all when it comes to suds, so we’re salivating over the Lone Star arrival of Sierra Nevada’s Chico Estate Harvest Ale and Rogue’s Double Dead Guy Ale, too.

The Harvest Wine Trail concludes this weekend at 22 participating wineries, from Dripping Springs to Bend. Tickets, which entitle you to “a taste or a tasting” at the likes of Fall Creek, Flat Creek, Sister Creek, and Becker, are $30 apiece. Depending on the winery, prize drawings, guest-chef appearances, live music, and contests are on offer. Texaswinetrail.com for details and tix.